GVSU DII club hockey sweeps Ferris State

The Lakers outscored the Bulldogs 17-3 in two games

The Grand Valley State men’s club hockey team (Division II) had the Ferris State Bulldogs licking their wounds after GVSU won 9-2 at Ferris Friday, Oct. 14 and then won at home 8-1 Saturday, Oct. 15.

“Right through our lineup, we’re a better hockey team than Ferris is and that showed through Friday and again Saturday,” said GVSU coach Mike Forbes. “It’s hard for our guys to get motivated and I give them a lot of credit for staying with it tonight.”

Luke Holmes

GVL / Luke Holmes - Reede Burnett (12) pokes his stick at the player with possession of the puck. GVSU Men’s D2 Hockey defeated Ferris State University with a score of 8-1 on Saturday, Oct. 16, 2016.

Forbes recently announced Alex Ostrowski will be the captain for the season with Reede Burnett and Collin Finkhouse as assistant captains.

“It’s real nice to have the boys recognize something like that,” Ostrowski said. “I’ve been here three years now and I’m really excited.”

In the first period Saturday night, GVSU had several scoring opportunities, but couldn’t quite find the back of the net. The Lakers shot the puck low, but could not sneak it past Ferris goalie Brett Schmekel.

Once the second period got underway, the goals started racking up as GVSU started elevating the puck more.

“Their goaltender, honestly if it hadn’t been for him, we could’ve scored 16 to 18 goals tonight,” Forbes said. “He made a lot of saves and very, very difficult saves so he was kind of left to his own devices there.”

Going into the third period, GVSU was already up 4-1 with goals from Matt Sherman, Connor McEvoy, Troy Marrett and Zach Resnick.

The more goals, the more frustrated Ferris got, fans included. The game got a lot more chippy with fights and penalties. Out of all the penalties in the entire game, 14 out of the 24 total were in the third.

“It’s hard because you always end up blaming other people and end up focusing on the refs," Forbes said. "Your attention isn’t on what you need to do on the ice, then you start complaining about offsides and complaining about this guy hitting that guy. You lose focus of the game.

“The more time you spend on complaining about somebody else, the more time you’re not focusing on what you need to do yourself.”

Toward the end of the third period, open ice hits and thrown fists were a common sight. GVSU’s Dan Smith was disqualified from the game.

But that didn’t faze the Lakers, as they only allowed one goal the entire game with backup goalie Jared Maddock starting in net. For goalies, making the net look as small as possible is key.

“I’m not the tallest goalie or the biggest goalie so I need to get out a lot more to cover a lot more of the net, so I just try to be as big in the net as possible,” Maddock said.

Focus seems to be the mantra of this team in a long and grueling season.

“In a game like that, it’s hard to stay focused for three periods, but we just got to be disciplined from now on,” Marrett said.

The next home game for GVSU is Friday, Nov. 11 against Lindenwood at 9 p.m. at Georgetown Ice Center.